{"id":25353,"date":"2024-10-14T12:52:31","date_gmt":"2024-10-14T18:52:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/big-high-school-ag-event-at-the-fairgrounds\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T05:15:22","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T05:15:22","slug":"big-high-school-ag-event-at-the-fairgrounds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/big-high-school-ag-event-at-the-fairgrounds\/","title":{"rendered":"BIG high school ag event at the fairgrounds"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Students
Students mingling at the BIG ag event at the fairgrounds on Friday, Oct. 11. (Cameryn Cass\/The Journal)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

Ten state FFA officers came to Cortez on Friday to encourage students in high school agriculture classes to get involved with the organization.<\/p>\n

The officers are high school students in elected positions, and Cortez was their last of 10 stops around the state.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re here to get students excited and involved,\u201d said Natalie Wright, a state officer and reporter. \u201cThey have a place in FFA.\u201d<\/p>\n

Twenty students from schools in Bayfield, Ignacio, Durango, Dolores County and Montezuma-Cortez high school went to the Montezuma County Fairgrounds Friday morning for the BIG \u2013 Becoming Involved as a Greenhand \u2013 event.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not even ag-based today. We\u2019re just getting them excited,\u201d said Wright. \u201cI\u2019m sure they\u2019ll all be best friends by the end of the day.\u201d<\/p>\n

They started off with introductions. And then they danced and played bingo, with a twist. Instead of crossing out numbers like B-12, students went around the room and asked each other questions \u2013 whether they play a sport or an instrument, for instance \u2013 and filled their boards with names of those who fit the descriptions.<\/p>\n

\"A
A state officer fills out the bingo board. (Cameryn Cass\/The Journal)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

The idea was to break students out of their comfort zone, Wright said.<\/p>\n

There were also a few workshops where they learned more about FFA and what getting involved looks like and might offer them. The four state officers The Journal<\/em> spoke to underscored the invaluable connections they\u2019ve made through FFA.<\/p>\n

\"BIG
BIG stands for Becoming Involved as a Greenhand. (Cameryn Cass\/The Journal)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

\u201cI encourage people to invest their time and attention to FFA. It\u2019s ag-based, but it focuses on building the next generation of leaders and well-rounded people,\u201d said Aidan Datteri, a state officer and treasurer whose grandfather and father were involved in the organization before him.<\/p>\n

\u201cI fell in love with it my freshman year, and now it\u2019s about making a difference in people\u2019s lives and being a support they\u2019ve never had,\u201d Datteri said.<\/p>\n

Since its founding in 1928 until 1988, what\u2019s now known as the National FFA Organization was called the Future Farmers of America. Its name changed to encompass more than just farmers.<\/p>\n

Essentially, it wanted to broaden its initiative to include those interested in science, technology, industry, math and production farming, too \u2013 not just traditional farming, according to its website.<\/p>\n

To date, there\u2019s over 1 million members nationwide from all 50 states, plus Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.<\/p>\n

When students take a high school ag class, they\u2019re automatically enrolled in FFA, but they get to choose their level of involvement with it. Students are able to join in any grade, not just freshman year.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s easy to overlook because we\u2019re not a sport,\u201d said Wright. \u201cBut nationally, there\u2019s over a million members, and its growing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Aunica Naranjo, a state officer from Cortez, said there\u2019s 9,000 members across Colorado, and that number is growing, too.<\/p>\n

\u201cCortez is rural \u2013 it\u2019s bigger than some other places around here, but it\u2019s still rural,\u201d said Naranjo. \u201cThere\u2019s agriculture all around us here, and sometimes it\u2019s hard to notice.\u201d<\/p>\n

Naranjo said she first got interested in agriculture through 4-H growing up, and that FFA, in her eyes, was a good next step.<\/p>\n

\u201cTry anything that minorly interests you and take as many opportunities as you can,\u201d Naranjo said.<\/p>\n

Come Oct. 21, the officers will hit the road again and head east to Indianapolis for the National FFA convention, which starts on Oct. 23 and ends Oct. 26. In years past, over 72,000 students attended. This year is the 97th annual national convention.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe best way I can describe it is a sea of blue jackets,\u201d said Weston Burkhart, a state officer sporting the uniform he spoke of: A dark blue corduroy jacket with \u201cColorado Association\u201d and the FFA seal embroidered on the back.<\/p>\n

The event at the fairgrounds was to show students that FFA is about more than being a student. It emphasizes being leaders and pursuing agriculture in ways they personally find interesting and meaningful.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Colorado officers from the National FFA Organization visit Montezuma County Fairgrounds <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":25354,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[281,21,28,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-25353","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-agriculture","tag-cortez","tag-headlines","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25353","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25353"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25353\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":78899,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25353\/revisions\/78899"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25354"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25353"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25353"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25353"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=25353"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}